Battlestar Galactica Showrunner: "The Cylons Had No Plan"

The cast of Syfy's Battlestar Galactica, along with series executive producer/showrunner Ron Moore, reunited for a Q&A panel at the Austin Television Festival this past weekend, where a question was posed - "What was the Cylons' plan?"

As you recall, BSG episodes opened with:

"The cylons were created by man . They evolved. They rebelled. There are many copies. And they have a plan."

"There was no plan," Moore laughed.

"It all came about when we were doing the main titles and we had to have what's called a 'precap' as opposed to a recap," he said. "So we had a precap before the main title. And David [Eick, executive producer] said we should have a punchy line there at the end...'and they have a plan.' And I was like 'What does that mean?' He said 'It doesn't matter, doesn't matter. It'll be great. The audience will love it.'

"I said 'But they don't have a plan, David.' He said 'Trust me, this is marketing. We'll figure it out later.' So for the next fourteen years of my life people have asked me 'So what was the plan?' There's no f***ing plan!"

Later on, a question was asked about what Battlestar Galactica would be like if it were made today in 2017. The series, which was conceptualized post-9/11, had very specific messaging in mind that correlated with the political climate of the time. Now though, Moore wasn't sure what social or political angles he'd take with the series. He did state, however, "Today we would write it as a flat-out serial," noting that back then networks weren't as comfortable with straight serialization. "There was no way to catch up on shows, DVR penetration wasn’t that high. Networks wanted each episode to stand alone."

Mary McDonnell, who played President Laura Roslin on the series, offered up “The idea of forcing a collected group of people to see each other as one is the thing that continually resonates with me. The powers-that-be are trying to create as much difference between us as their pocketbooks will allow. With Battlestar Galactica we have a reminder that it could all go away like that."